


My Back to the Fire

by merriman



Category: Dark Is Rising Sequence - Susan Cooper, Highlander: The Series
Genre: Crossover, M/M, Time Travel
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-06-06
Updated: 2016-06-06
Packaged: 2018-07-12 14:12:25
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 9,253
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7108483
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/merriman/pseuds/merriman
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The Horsemen once served the Dark, whether they knew it or not. In 1997, Will must find a way to keep the reunited Horsemen from bring the Dark back into the world while hiding his actions from Bran.</p>
            </blockquote>





	My Back to the Fire

**Author's Note:**

  * For [0positiv](https://archiveofourown.org/users/0positiv/gifts).



> I was going to attempt two separate stories, but during a review of the Horsemen episodes of Highlander I came across Methos' comment that the submarine base is "Kronos' version of Camelot." And there it was, a crossover. I've wanted to try a crossover with these two fandoms for ages, so thank you to my recipient for requesting them!
> 
> Highlander was never quite clear on just where the Horsemen operated. I've left it vague here as well.
> 
> My apologies for any mistakes in the geography of Bordeaux. I've done my best with maps and the like.
> 
> Thank you to A, T, and S for beta duty and thank you to L for letting me bounce ideas.

_Becoming the Horsemen didn't happen overnight. Methos couldn't point to a single event that had precipitated it, couldn't really look back and pick out when he'd known that they were monsters. It hadn't started that way. It had started with a caravan and a different group of raiders and running across the dunes together. It didn't begin with darkness. The light dimmed so slowly and when the darkness was lit by so many fires, well, what was the difference really?_

\--- Bronze Age - Methos ---

Methos looked out over the sand and put his hand on the hilt of his sword as the other caravan guard came up the hill behind him. They'd signed on at the same time, eyeing each other warily but not drawing blades. It was possible the fight would happen here. It always came down to fighting.

"Seems peaceful enough," Kronos said as he took a seat next to Methos. He had his sword at his side too, but his hands were simply clasped over his knees. Methos spared a bit of attention to look at him. Kronos had seen his share of violence, that much was obvious, but he was smiling as he surveyed the empty sand and turned to catch Methos' eye.

"It has been," Methos agreed. "I'm good for the night, if you want to sleep more."

Kronos shook his head. "No, I like the night. Always preferred it."

"As have I," Methos said, letting his hand drop a bit from his sword. Kronos didn't move, but Methos was certain the man had noticed. No Immortals lived long without being acutely aware of their surroundings. They sat there together for an hour, silent but for the sound of Methos digging his toes into the sand. 

"You're not going to challenge me, are you," Kronos said, turning to look at Methos in the darkness.

"No," Methos said. "No, I'm not. Maybe after we're done with this caravan. Maybe not. I haven't decided. I thought you would challenge me."

"I'd rather not," Kronos said. "I've been traveling alone for too long. It would be good to have someone I could trust at my back. Someone who knows what dangers lurk out there, beyond what mortals know."

Methos nodded. He'd been alone for a long time too. Even guarding the caravans didn't provide the sort of company he'd been looking for. The people had their own lives they didn't really share with hired guards. Methos was considering his response when he heard something on the breeze. The slightest sound of sand shifting. Kronos was already in motion, slowly pivoting towards the sound. Methos caught a whiff of stale sweat from nearby and turned towards it. 

Back to back, they crouched, swords out. When the raiding party came into view, Kronos shouted and dove for the nearest man, taking him down with a slice to his throat. Methos caught another in the gut. By then the noise had alerted the caravan. Anyone who could fight came at a run, with the rest fortifying the camp and keeping guard with bows and hastily-lit torches. 

There were more raiders than either Methos or Kronos had expected, but none of them survived the fight. That both Methos and Kronos took what should have been fatal wounds was inconsequential, or it would have been, had they gone unnoticed by anyone else from the caravan. Two of the wagons were on fire, five of the caravan members dead on the sand along with ten raiders. Methos pressed his hand to the hole in his side and hoped it would close before anyone saw.

But they had seen. They saw the gaping wounds. They saw them close. They saw that their guards had saved them, yes, but that they were not human.

Two nights later, just a day's ride from their destination, the caravan leader put something in their food. Methos and Kronos woke under the scorching sun over three days later. They had been tied up, stabbed through their hearts, and left in the desert for scavengers.

Methos looked at Kronos as they walked together, away from anywhere they had known.

"We can only count on each other," Kronos told him that night. It was dark, the moon hidden by clouds and the only light was the small fire they'd built. "The mortals, they fear us, when all we did was help them. We'll give them something to fear." 

Methos watched the embers in the middle of the fire and nodded. "First we need some horses," he told Kronos. "Then, we ride."

\---1997 - London - Will and Bran ---

"Have you heard from the Drews?" Bran asked, breaking the easy silence that had grown in the flat as he and Will had both focused on work.

Will looked up and over at him, blinking slowly and lifting a hand to push his hair back. He glanced down again, noting that he'd been reading the same page for the past half hour while his mind had wandered. There was a shadow on the edge of his perception, just the slightest blot where there should have been only light. It had happened before, stray remnants of the Dark drawing his notice and forcing him to act. When the Light had won and his master, Merriman, had proclaimed that the fate of humanity was now entirely up to humans, he'd naively thought that meant the Dark was completely gone. As it turned out, the Dark was quite good at having secreted bits of itself away inside humans themselves, hiding until a choice opportunity presented itself. This was possibly something like that, He made a note of it in his mind and looked at Bran again.

"Simon left me a message. He said Jane is definitely coming, but Barney still hasn't said yes or no. Something about needing to finish up a piece for his portfolio."

Bran nodded. "I hope he does come," he said as he closed his books and stood to stretch. "We haven't all of us been in the same place in years. There's always one of us who can't make it."

Will made a vague noise of agreement. The last time they'd all been together had been an accident. Bran and Jane and Barney and Simon had all laughed about it when they'd met on a train platform. Will had gotten a sense that the Drews were near, but not soon enough to keep them from meeting up with himself and Bran. He'd never been quite sure if it was a risk to get them all in one place. If it would press on their memories just a little too hard. But nothing had happened then and it seemed like asking for trouble to worry about it now. The Drews would be visiting London for Bran's birthday and that was that.

"Will?" Bran was peering at him, head tilted a little in concern. Will shook himself. No use lingering on it all. It would only concern Bran and he couldn't very well explain it. That was the risk he'd taken, moving in with Bran when they'd both come to London.

"Sorry, just thinking," Will told him, smiling. "It really has been too long since we've all gotten together."

"You think too much," Bran informed him. "Come on. I'm starving and the cupboards are bare."

Normally it would have been distracting enough, going out and getting dinner, walking around the city with Bran, talking about their various projects and plans, but that shadow was still there when they got home. It lurked at the back of Will's awareness well after Bran was asleep and the flat held only the sounds from the road outside and their upstairs neighbor's insomniac dog. 

It was something nearby. France, maybe. It was growing and it burned with the cold fires of the Dark.

\--- Bronze Age - Methos and Kronos ---

There were a dozen small fires burning in the valley below them. They had put torch to everything that would catch, riding through the tiny village like a plague. There had even been traders stopped there for the night, and they had set the wagons on fire too. The people who had tried to run, they cut down. Now they sat astride their horses looking over the valley, watching the night glow with their work.

"How did you even know this was here?" Kronos asked Methos. "It was well hidden."

"I lived here once," Methos told his brother, not taking his eyes from the flames. "Many years ago. I took care of them. And they drove me out when I did not grow old. They threw stones and chased me until we were far enough from the valley. But I never forgot where it was. I never forgot their faces, the people I helped, wanting me dead."

Kronos was nodding. "Good."

When they were certain that none had escaped, they turned their horses and rode back to their own camp. 

"I've been thinking," Kronos said as they took care of the horses for the night. "We could use another with us. We could do more, three or four of us."

Methos kept his frown to himself. It was dark enough - they hadn't lit a campfire on their return, no need really. Kronos wasn't even looking in his direction. But what did they need another for? They were brothers already. They didn't need more. But Kronos was still talking about the raids they could take on and the spoils they could claim if they had more brothers, and really, Methos hadn't had a family in so very long.

\--- 1997 - London/Bordeaux - Will ---

"It's just for a couple of days," Will assured Bran a week after that initial sense of darkness. "I'll be back before you know it. You'll be so wrapped up in your work you won't even miss me."

He'd already booked the trip, made arrangements for a place to stay. The darkness was spreading. He could feel it shifting, moving from place to place, searching for something. It had even jumped the Atlantic once, but then returned stronger. Will knew he had to go. He'd even come up with a fairly believable story about having to meet with a colleague of his father's. It helped that he'd actually done work for his father in the past, picking up pieces of jewelry in the city and bringing them home, or meeting with people when his father couldn't. It was a handy bit of cover Will had been building on for just this sort of purpose. Still, France was further than he'd ever gone for his father before.

"I just wish you'd told me you were going," Bran said with a sigh. It was a sigh that Will recognized as Bran's resignation that there were some things that never added up and that he knew Will would never explain. In the blink of an eye, Will could see the possibility there, that it would split them apart, the secrets and hidden memories too much together. Bran would get fed up, leave, go back to Wales like he'd always said he would eventually. But he'd go alone.

"Look," Will said, taking a seat next to him. "I didn't know I'd have to until this morning. I won't even be gone a week."

Bran shrugged and leaned against him. "Yeah. Fine."

He had the whole train ride to Bordeaux to feel nicely guilty about the whole thing. Bran deserved better than someone who just plain couldn't explain things to him. Who had to keep secrets for the sake of humanity's future and safety. It wasn't fair. Then again, it wasn't precisely fair that Will had this whole watchkeeper-of-humanity job on his own. The 24 year old in him thought about that every so often. The Old One wasn't as bothered. He had a responsibility bigger than one relationship, no matter how much it mattered to him. 

When Will arrived in Bordeaux he could feel the air was colder than it should have been, a chill that the people around him likely just attributed to some unseasonable weather. But it wasn't an errant weather pattern. Something was gathering nearby. Something old. Several somethings, if he didn't miss his guess. They were close by, whoever they were, so Will checked into his hotel and started to take stock of the city. 

Walking around Bordeaux, Will took care to seem innocuous while keeping his guard up. After all, he had no idea yet if this darkness was a true servant of the Dark, as aware of its role as much as Will was of his own, or if it was something else entirely. While he walked the city's streets he took note of a few people commenting on the cool breeze blowing in, several couples arguing, a woman telling a friend she felt trapped. It was dark by the time he decided it was time to give up for the night, and then there they were. 

Two men walked towards the cafe where he sat, focused on their own conversation in a language they likely thought long dead. But for the knowledge of the Old Ones, Will wouldn't have understood a word, but he could make out a bit of their conversation as they passed, something about the old submarine base in the city, something about their brothers and supplies. They walked right past where Will was sitting and gave him no notice. There was something about them. Something old and hungry that smelled like ozone. One of them, a man with a scar over his right eye, he was as much a creature of the Dark as any Will had seen. But the other, the other man was something else. He had once been the same, but Will could tell the other man was questioning it. Perhaps he could be pushed a little. Perhaps.

\--- Bronze Age - Methos and Kronos ---

There had been a point when Methos had considered leaving his brothers. He could have taken his horse and left at any time, but after a century of riding together that was unthinkable. There had been a reason once, a purpose to the killing and pillaging and all the fires. Revenge, survival, it was all blended together but it had been a reason. Now the only reason they needed was that they could. They could do it and they did it well and they enjoyed it. Why would he walk away from that?

"You're quiet, brother," Kronos commented as they sat in front of their tents while their other brothers argued over dividing up what they'd taken from their latest raid.

"I am always quiet," Methos reminded him. "It merely means I'm thinking."

Kronos tossed a skin of ale to him and Methos drank from it before tossing it back.

"I've been thinking too," Kronos said as he caught the skin.

"Oh?" Methos looked over at him. Kronos looked utterly relaxed, yet still ready to strike if need be. Methos had long admired that. It was something he'd worked hard to cultivate in his own posture.

"There's a village, a few days' ride to the north. A bit bigger than we've hit before, growing fast. It's moated. We could take it over."

"With only the four of us, that will take some planning," Methos said, but ideas were already rising in his mind. He would have to see the village first, get to know it, walk its paths, inspect its buildings and people and defenses. They had a reputation by now, of course, but they could simply leave the horses at camp, walk in on foot, go alone or in pairs. That was an advantage of the masks - even those few they set loose to cry their names to others did not know their faces.

"Yes," Kronos agreed, smiling as he knew Methos was considering it. "Yes it will. And it will be glorious."

They started to ride north early in the morning. Caspian and Silas hadn't questioned it when Methos and Kronos had told them the plan, but then neither of them were inclined to argue about such things. Silas knew his strength was just that, his strength. Caspian would pick a fight with Methos just to annoy him and laugh, but he never picked fights with Kronos. If Kronos said they were riding north, they were riding north. It made things easier to just do what he said. Less blood that way.

"I think I should walk in alone," Methos said to Kronos when Kronos came up alongside him around midday. "I can always just say I'm looking for work. It's even true, from a certain perspective."

Kronos laughed. "Indeed, brother. And I trust you will be able to handle yourself without arousing any suspicions."

Methos followed Kronos' glance towards Caspian, then Silas. No, neither of them were men who could walk into a city and walk out later without any undue attention.

"Ideally, I would say we should go together, but they've been arguing too much to leave them alone," Methos muttered.

"I'll keep them under control," Kronos assured him. "You learn what you need to, then return. We can plan better once you know what we have to handle."

\--- 1997 - Bordeaux - Will and Bran ---

The coolness of the air in Bordeaux seemed to seep through the walls of Will's hotel. He woke in the night, dreams of an ancient desert still clear in his mind even as he shivered and pulled on an extra shirt. Those two men, somehow they weren't quite human. They weren't anything he'd encountered before or anything he'd learned about. But they were old. He'd have to find a way to get to one of them, maybe in the past. If he found the right leverage, he could move the man away from the Dark enough that here, now, he would turn on his brother.

Will watched the street outside his hotel from his window. He'd have to find a way back. There was always a way, if you could find the right hook into history. 

In the morning he set out again, determined to find out more, but the men he'd seen before were nowhere to be found. Instead, Will felt a brightness he hadn't expected. There shouldn't have been any Light servants around aside from himself and yet it was unmistakeable. He was almost back to his hotel when he finally spotted who it was. At a hotel near his own there was a man on a balcony, talking to a woman. The man wasn't anyone Will had ever met before, but he all but shone in Will's sight. Whether he knew it or not, the man had been serving the Light for a long time. A very long time. He wasn't as old as the other two, but the woman was. 

Will watched them for a while, wondering how they tied in to all of this. They had to figure into it somehow. When the pair left their balcony, Will headed back to his own hotel and was almost too distracted to notice Bran waiting in the lobby.

"Will!" Bran got up from his seat as Will walked over.

"Bran? What are you doing here?" Will asked. Of course, he knew what Bran was doing. He was joining Will on what Bran thought was just some business trip, likely figuring that Will would be glad of the company on something fairly mundane.

"It was too quiet back at the flat, so I thought well, I knew where you were staying, and I've never been to Bordeaux." Bran was hesitant now. Will could see he'd meant the best by it and was having second thoughts. 

"Well, you're here now," Will said, putting on a genuine smile. It complicated things, having Bran here, but it was nice to not be so alone. "Come on, we'll get you a key to the room and go up."

Once up in Will's room, now his and Bran's it seemed, Bran stowed his things in the closet and took a seat on the bed.

"Now then," he said, looking at Will. "Have you finished with whatever your father needed you to do?"

Will sat down next to him and sighed. "Not yet," he said, thinking quickly. "I was supposed to meet with someone, but then he had to postpone, and I've just been waiting. My father did warn me it might take a few days."

"So that means you have the afternoon free?" Bran asked, smiling. 

Will nodded. "I've got to phone him in the morning."

"Then we can play tourist today. There's something I wanted to see anyhow. Read about it once. There's a Roman amphitheater, right in the city."

A warning sounded in Will's head. The amphitheater, an ancient location, even if it wasn't actually where he needed to be. It was still likely his best chance of finding a hook into the past. Except he wouldn't be alone. Wouldn't be able to simply slip away and do what he needed to do unnoticed. Or maybe he could, if there was a tour of some kind and he managed to get "lost" somehow. And it needed doing, whether he was alone or not. This sort of thing was likely to have happened eventually. If this was how it had to be, then that was that. Will smiled at Bran and nodded.

"Sure. It's not far, I don't think. A short walk?"

"Least it's decent out," Bran said as he put his glasses back on. "Bit of a chill, though, isn't it?"

The only thing to be said for the cooler air was that it made the walk to the amphitheater refreshing. Bran didn't remark upon it again and Will didn't want to think about how it felt it had dropped another degree or two since the morning. Something had to be done, and quickly.

There was indeed a tour moving through the amphitheater and Will and Bran tagged along at the back of the group, only half paying attention as they looked around. Bran was distracted enough, and there didn't seem to be any particular pull to the past, so Will thought maybe it wouldn't end up mattering. Except then the guide was talking about various invasions of Bordeaux, the Romans, Vandals, Visigoths and so on. That was it, that was what Will needed. He focused on the guide's voice, envisioning the sacking of the city by different armies until he was somewhere else entirely. Not Bordeaux, certainly. Not France. But it was a settlement, a village, and it was under threat, though it didn't know it yet.

Will looked around, spotting the man he'd seen earlier in Bordeaux. The one he thought might be the key. He started towards him when he felt a tug at his arm.

"Will?" Bran said slowly. "Will… Where are we, and am I hallucinating?"

Will winced and turned to him. "Bran. It's complicated. And dangerous. Just, please, stay with me and let me do something and I promise I will explain."

\--- Bronze Age - Methos ---

Methos had left his brothers back at their camp a good distance outside of the village. No need to alarm the people this early. He'd changed into simple traveling clothes, put together a pack of gear one might expect a man on his own to be carrying, found himself a walking stick and gone into the village on foot.

It was a little bigger than Kronos had described, though he had said it was growing. The moat around it limited how much space it could take, but there were buildings outside the moat too, all around it. Methos walked in among several people who appeared to be there to do business. No one paid him any particular attention and he kept that in mind as he followed people towards the village square where a marketplace had been set up.

The people were actually friendly, a handful smiling at him in the marketplace as he browsed, then made a purchase. They weren't fearful or suspicious. They didn't for one moment suspect that anyone had designs on their home. Not that Methos thought he and his brothers could take this place with brute force. No, it would take planning and patience and treachery. Not his brothers' favorite methods, but Kronos at least would hear him out.

Methos took a seat on the ground to eat what he'd purchased and observe the people. He took note of how many were present, who were locals and who seemed to be strangers like himself. He kept track of arrivals and departures, trades, disputes, guards, everything about the marketplace. It was the heart of a village like this. If they were going to take it, they had to know it.

In the middle of the marketplace was a well. There would likely be others nearby, and the moat had to feed from somewhere. Water sources were so precious, so vital, so vulnerable. But if they poisoned the water then they'd likely just end up razing the place to the ground. Perhaps that had been Kronos' true aim anyhow. He didn't really care to leave much intact when he came through a place. He'd want to at least set a few fires, kill a few dozen. Methos shook his head at the thought. The world was changing around them. They needed to adapt.

\--- Bronze Age - Will and Bran ---

Will turned back to look into the marketplace. The man was still there, having taken a seat to eat something and apparently watch the people. He looked as if he would be there for a time and Will took the moment to turn back to Bran.

"There is a great deal you don't know," he told him. "About me, about the world, about things outside the world. Will you trust that I'll explain when I can?"

Bran hesitated, then nodded. "I will. I have the feeling you owe me, for more than just this."

Will winced slightly and sighed. "I do. But this can't wait. We're here, thousands of years in the past, to do one thing: Convince that man sitting over there that he should change how he lives."

"Why?" Bran asked, peering past Will into the marketplace to find the man Will spoke of. "What is he doing?"

"I don't quite know the specifics. Not yet," Will admitted. "But he is on a dangerous path, a dark path. It will lead to disaster in the present. In Bordeaux. But if I can change things here, now, then we might avert that disaster. Of all of them, I think this one man is the one I could convince to change. I didn't mean to bring you with me. But perhaps this was meant to be."

Bran listened closely. Will could feel how intent Bran was on every word Will said. Something in him was waking, something long dormant and hidden. He could see Bran's posture slowly adjust, his shoulders back just slightly, his head held higher. Through the trick of the Old Ones' method of travel, they were dressed to fit this time and Bran's usual dark glasses were gone, his golden eyes visible. Yes, this was something he'd meant to avoid, but it seemed it might be exactly what was needed. Bran wasn't even really questioning just how they had gotten themselves thousands of years and who knew how many miles from home.

"So, how do we do that?" Bran asked. "How do we convince him?"

"We talk to him," Will said. "We find something in him that isn't darkness and we draw it out, use it to set him in a new direction. One he might have found eventually on his own, but perhaps not until too late. We plant the seed now and let it grow over the millennia ahead."

Bran nodded, his gaze still on the man in the marketplace. "I'm going to stand out," he noted. "I always do. Even in London, I still catch people looking at me, even though they always pretend they weren't. If we're going to do something, we should do it before someone gets to wondering where the strange pale boy came from."

Will had been thinking along similar lines. It all would have been easier if he'd been alone. He knew he himself didn't stand out in a crowd. That was often a blessing in situations where he had to do something unobserved. Bran, on the other hand, with his white hair and bleached skin, he was memorable. All Will could hope was that the magic of the Old Ones that had always before allowed him and other Old Ones to slip in where needed and then leave without much notice, would keep these villagers from truly seeing Bran as he was. Perhaps to them Bran would be as unremarkable as Will himself appeared to be.

"He's moving," Bran said, nodding in the direction of the marketplace. The man had gotten to his feet and was walking through the market, weaving past stalls as if he'd lived there his whole life and knew the layout. Soon, he had disappeared out of the market and into the rest of the village.

"What now?" Bran asked as Will tried to tell where the man had gone. 

"We wait," Will told him. "He's not leaving, not yet. He'll be back tonight." How he knew that, and how he was coming to know more about the man and his brothers, he couldn't have explained. But he knew it to be true. The man had other business here. Business he would deal with after dark.

\--- Bronze Age - Methos ---

Methos found a place to sit for the night, watching silently as the village's guards made their rounds. They weren't too bad, he had to admit. There weren't nearly enough of them, but they were vigilant. No one sleeping at their posts that he could see. But the place was big enough that there would always be parts of it unobserved. Methos sat and waited through the darkness. Kronos and the others had known he would be gone for the night, perhaps even another if there was need of it. They would be awake in the camp, sitting at the fire. Caspian would be prodding at Silas, trying to incite the larger man to rage. Kronos would be watching them, entertained as always by their arguments. Methos usually stopped them, distracting Silas or threatening Caspian, but Kronos always watched. Some day, Methos was sure, they would actually come to blows. They had all vowed never to raise blades against each other, but that didn't mean Silas wouldn't pound Caspian's skull in just for the satisfaction of the resulting silence.

A little before dawn Methos got up to stretch his legs. He'd been watching the well in the marketplace much of the night and there had been several opportunities to tamper with it. For now, however, he merely wanted a drink. As people started to filter into the market he walked over to the well and carefully lowered the bucket. It was deep and dark and he peered down to get a better look. When he straightened up there were two other men in the marketplace, not ones he'd seen the day before. They didn't seem to be with any of the locals who were setting up their wares or coming to make early trades. They were walking in his direction. Or perhaps the direction of the well. It was all one and the same at the moment.

They were an interesting pair and Methos watched as they approached. One was barely memorable - Methos was sure if he looked away he would forget the man's face entirely. He was so plain and unremarkable that Methos instantly distrusted him. There was something about him that set his teeth on edge. The other, however, was quite the opposite. He was oddly pale, with white hair, yet clearly still a young man. Watching him, Methos suspected he would remember this man's face for the rest of his hopefully very long life. Neither was Immortal, of that he was certain. Nor did either feel quite like one with the potential for Immortality. But there was something about them. Something odd and different and out of place.

The unremarkable one nodded to him as they neared. The pale one stood just behind him, watching Methos with undisguised curiosity. 

"Good day," the unremarkable one said, and Methos nodded back to him but did not answer. The young man seemed to take that as a cue to keep talking. "We were hoping we could have a word with you."

"With me?" Methos asked. There was something strange about how the young man spoke. Methos couldn't quite put his finger on it.

"Yes, with you, Methos."

No one knew his name these days. He had spent a long time burying it in rumor, detaching it from his face. Without his mask, without his brothers, he had no name now. Yet here was a stranger his instincts screamed at him to avoid, greeting him with it as if they were old friends. Methos hid his surprise and nodded. If they knew his name, well, that deserved a few minutes of his time.

"Join me, then," Methos said, gesturing to a pair of benches near the edge of the marketplace. "And you can tell me how you came to hear that name."

Neither of the young men spoke until they were seated, Methos facing them. 

"I did not hear it," the plain man said once they were settled. "I know it, as I know many things."

Methos allowed a slight frown to curl his mouth. "And I suppose you think you know me, then?" he asked. "No one knows me."

"I know enough," the man said. "I know that there is more to you than the name you use now. More than the mask you wear when you ride."

The more the plain man spoke, the more some dark tendril in Methos' gut uncurled and stretched along his veins, filling him with a cold sense of clarity. This man was dangerous. He was the enemy. He was some sort of spirit sent to taunt Methos with lies.

"You say you know there is more to me, but I know myself," Methos told him. "And a spirit like yourself could not know me."

"Perhaps not," the pale man said, speaking at last. "But I could, and I do. I am a seer. And I see plenty."

\--- Bronze Age - Will and Bran ---

Throughout the night, while they waited, Will had explained what he could to Bran. He'd told him some about the Dark and the Light, about some of the battles between the two. He'd glossed over the specifics about the final true battle, where the Dark had been vanquished, but he had explained that he was the last guardian of the Light, that he could travel into the past, intuit things about some of those around him. He had explained his current goal and watched as Bran made the conscious decision to believe every word Will told him.

Eventually, Will knew he would have to deal with the consequences of this trip, of Bran learning even a small portion of the truth. But for now, it seemed to be playing to their advantage. Once close to their quarry, he'd been able to grasp enough about the man to know his name and more about him. He'd passed what he could on to Bran before they approached Methos in the morning. What Will hadn't counted on was the Dark's hold on Methos and Methos' recognition of Will as an agent of the Light. What the Dark hadn't counted on was Bran.

"I've never quite believed seers," Methos said to them. But his posture spoke otherwise. He was listening, almost eager despite trying to hide it. 

"Believe me," Bran said. "I have seen you. I have seen you destroy all you once cared about. I have seen your brothers."

That much Will had told him. There were four. He was certain of it now. Four brothers, riding on horseback like the Riders of the Dark. He expected Bran to urge Methos to listen to Will now, but Bran was continuing and Will was not entirely certain where he had gotten what he was saying.

"I have seen you kindle fires in halls of learning. I have seen your anger ignite entire forests. I have seen you lose yourself to your brother's will."

Methos was staring at Bran, expression unreadable. "And if I wish that?" he asked.

"You don't," Bran told him. "You know that. But I tell you now, if you stay with him? That will be all that you are. Ignorance and anger and nothing more than a tool in the hand of another."

None of them spoke for several minutes. Around them the marketplace was growing busy and people were passing them almost as if they weren't there. Will watched Methos as he took in what Bran had said, as he processed the future laid out for him.

"And if I walk away?" he asked quietly. "If I leave them in their camp and walk away now? Will they hunt me down as a traitor? Will I slink back to them?"

Bran shrugged. "Leave them and your fate is your own. If they hunt you down, run. If you slink back, it is your own undoing."

Methos nodded and looked up at the dawn sky, the sun not yet fully risen. Will ventured to stretch out his senses a bit, testing for the darkness in the other man. It was still there, coiled and sullen, but weaker now. 

"Do more with the time you have," Bran told Methos. "You have centuries ahead of you. Stop wasting them."

Bran stood and Will stood with him.

"And you?" Methos said, looking to Will again now. "What have you to say?"

"I say listen to him," Will told him. "I am no spirit. I merely take care of him. And he is very wise."

Methos nodded, apparently more inclined to trust Will now. He reached down and picked up the pack he'd had with him, then stood and slung it over his shoulder. "Then I should be finding a road to walk," he told them. And without another word he walked away, out of the marketplace and down the paths of the village.

Will looked at Bran. "We need to go now," he told him. "We need to get home."

Leaving was easier than traveling there had been. With their task completed, Will simply led Bran out of the marketplace and as they walked down an alley in this unnamed and unknown village they found themselves emerging from a far more modern one in Bordeaux. 

"I think maybe we have things to talk about," Bran said as he patted his pockets for his glasses, found them, then put them on.

"We do," Will told him. "Let's go back to the hotel."

\--- Bronze Age - Methos ---

Without his horse, Methos knew he wasn't making very good time. Still, he was a fair distance from the town now, his brothers' camp even further behind him. He'd been walking for hours, following a dusty road that hopefully led to somewhere he could blend in. He hadn't even truly considered turning back, though he could still do so and none of his brothers would be the wiser.

Why had he listened to that strange young man? True seers were rare in Methos' experience. Mostly those who made such claims were simply frauds, reading their marks and delivering nothing anyone could prove. But there had been something more to those young men. Both of them. The plain one had known his name, had used it without fear. There had been something bright and sharp to him, like a polished blade in the sun. Thinking on him now, Methos felt little of his earlier apprehension. The pale one hadn't had the same sort of brightness to him. Methos considered him as he walked. There had been something about him that demanded respect, even from someone as feared as Methos himself was. But there had also been a sense that perhaps there was more hidden from him than not. That he could look at others and know them in return for not knowing himself.

Methos shook himself a little. He had to leave them back there, where they belonged. If they belonged anywhere. To survive, he knew he could not dwell on the past. Moving forward was the only way. If the pale seer had seen ignorance and anger in his future, then he would do what he could to learn peacefully instead. As his plans went, it was lacking in specifics. But given the open road ahead of him and the day's sun over his head, Methos felt certain he had plenty of time to figure it out.

\--- 1997 - Bordeaux - Will and Bran ---

"You're lucky I didn't crack when you called me wise," Bran told Will after they'd returned to their room and made certain the door was shut nice and tight. "I almost did when he called you a spirit, and that wouldn't have given us any credibility at all."

"Oh, and you should talk!" Will retorted. "You went very Yoda for a bit there. Where did that come from?"

"I should very well ask you the same thing," Bran pointed out. "This whole time I've known you and you've been a part of this gigantic magical war and I never knew! Of course I knew something was going on with you, I just thought maybe it was smuggling or some such."

"Smuggling?" Will stared at Bran. "Smuggling what?"

"Jewels! Diamonds! I don't know," Bran said as he sat down on the bed and took off his glasses to fiddle with the screw on one side. "But you have always been so secretive. Even since that year we met. Do not think I haven't thought back to that time, Will. Something happened then that I did not see."

"You see plenty," Will sighed. "Before we get to any of that, how did you know to say what you did? I certainly didn't give you any of that about fires and being his brother's tool."

Bran shrugged and tucked his glasses away. "Would you believe me if I said I really did see it? Not with my eyes, no, but it was there in my head, the right things to say."

Will watched him for a few moments, then took a seat next to him. "I would believe it, yes," he said. "Sometimes the magic works oddly, coming to someone near me. I've seen it before. If the path it needs isn't through me, it finds a way." As it had with Jane Drew a few times, and Barney. And now Bran. "I wish I could explain more, but I was never supposed to even let you know this much."

"Against the rules?" Bran guessed. "Will you have to pay a fine, I wonder?"

"It's possible," Will allowed, choosing to take the idea seriously. Then again, if he truly hadn't been allowed to let Bran know any of it, the magic wouldn't have let him bring Bran along, wouldn't have worked through him. No, there would be no fine, magical or otherwise. Bran had been necessary and so it was allowed.

"So now what?" Bran asked. "You said this man Methos is in Bordeaux with those brothers of his, getting up to who knows what trouble. How will we know if we managed to change his path?"

Will sighed, flopping back onto the bed next to Bran and reaching up to pull Bran down with him. "We're just going to have to go and spy on him," he admitted. "They're in the old submarine base. So catch a nap while you can, boyo. It's going to be a long night."

\--- 1997 - Bordeaux - Methos ---

Methos was getting awfully sick of Kronos' idea of a home. The base had wiring and it even worked properly. He'd never have been able to cook up that virus of his without a functional lab - and Methos had given more thought than he liked to just where Kronos had gotten himself educated in that particular subject. But despite the wiring and the lab and the simple fact that Kronos had clearly put time and effort into making the abandoned base liveable, it still felt like they were squatting. The lights were dim and sparse, even in rooms with no windows and therefore no risk of outside observation. The furniture was imposing and dreadfully uncomfortable.

Methos slouched in his seat at the big round table and wondered if Kronos was morally opposed to comfort. Or light. He seemed to depend mostly on fires lit in barrels, on torches, as if they'd gone straight from the middle ages to Mad Max. Vaguely, Methos considered his own annoyance at it all. There had been a time - and it felt not as long ago as it truly was - that he wouldn't have cared. That he would have appreciated the skulking ambiance. Now he was merely attempting to survive from moment to moment without drawing Kronos' suspicions, hoping that MacLeod would show up as he'd orchestrated.

Once, long long long ago, so long ago that it was little but a bright blur in his mind, Methos knew he had walked away from his brothers with no true plan at all. He had walked into a village intent on planning its downfall and walked out planning only to never see Kronos again. But that had been lifetimes ago, and Kronos had had no reason then to doubt him. He had plenty of reason now, and so the elaborate game of taunts and distractions and triple bluffs.

It had to happen soon. Methos got up from the table and paced the shadowed corridors down to where Kronos had locked up Cassandra. MacLeod would be coming, as Kronos had warned. He would be angry, but hopefully he would have figured it all out. Methos was done with having to hide in the dark.

\--- 1997 - Bordeaux - Will and Bran ---

"This feels very James Bond," Bran whispered as he and Will crept into the submarine base. It was a huge structure, imposing and decrepit on the outside and almost as bad on the inside, at least at first. The feeling of disuse abated once they got a ways in. There was a fire burning in a barrel around a corner at one point and Will motioned for Bran to follow him past it.

"It does a bit, doesn't it?" Will agreed quietly. Somewhere deeper in the base he could tell that the man he'd seen earlier, the one who was so strangely allied with the Light, was making his own way to the heart of it all. Somehow he had found the brothers, tracked them down and was intent on taking them out. Will picked up the pace, wanting to catch up.

"Like you said, I go with the winner." Methos' voice echoed down the corridor and Will paused. Had they failed? Was Methos even now going to give himself back to the Dark? He missed the next bit of conversation and then there was the sound of metal on metal, swords clanging against each other. Will peered through a doorway and caught sight of two men fighting. One was the man with the scar, the other was Will's anonymous and unwitting ally.

"We have to find Methos," he whispered to Bran, though now it seemed perhaps they didn't need to be so silent, not with the sounds of swordfighting echoing off the concrete walls.

Except where there had been the sound of one fight, now there were two. Will and Bran glanced at each other by torchlight and turned to find the second duel. 

Down near the water in the base they found Methos fighting a man who was as close to a giant as Will thought he would ever see. The giant had an axe instead of a sword and he swung it with a force that made Will wince. It seemed that Methos had indeed turned on his brothers, but would he survive doing so?

In time, all four men were in the same place, fighting on different platforms in the flooded submarine pens. Will and Bran crouched behind a stack of barrels and watched as the scarred man caught sight of his brothers fighting, then screamed. 

The lightning took Will a bit by surprise, if he was going to be honest. It certainly made sense of the scent of ozone he'd gotten off of Methos earlier. If this was part and parcel of whatever they were, whatever kept them alive through the centuries, it wasn't anything Will had been taught. That, by itself, was something to wonder at, really. Back when he had first come into his powers as an Old One, Will had thought he had learned all he would need to know, all there was to know. But this was new. It was good to find that there were still new things to discover.

Down below them the lightning was striking both Methos and the Light-allied man. The others were dead at their feet. Just when Will thought perhaps it would be over, the lightning coalesced into a vortex, spiraling between the two victors. The entire base seemed electrified and beside him, Will felt Bran tense suddenly, then slump against him. 

Confident that they'd done what they set out to do, Will gave not another thought to the men down below as he turned his focus on Bran. 

"Bran? What's wrong?" he whispered. 

Bran merely shook his head, so Will helped him up and out of the building. Those men were likely well capable of taking care of themselves.

\--- 1997 - Bordeaux - Methos ---

Methos took care of the bodies and the horrible furniture and the lab itself in Kronos' preferred manner: He lit a fire and watched it burn. The building itself was sturdy and meant to withstand such things, but the virus, the dead monkeys Kronos had tested it on, the ugly table they'd all sat around? They would all burn and melt and disappear. That task finished, Methos went and checked himself into a hotel in the city and took a long shower to remind himself that he was in the present. He wasn't the man he had been when he'd last seen Kronos.

In his hotel room, Methos turned on every lamp and sat through the night, wondering if he had burned too many bridges in order to finally be rid of his brother. On reflection, they were worth it. If he'd lost a friend or two or three, at least Kronos was gone. Given his own past, well, lost friends who'd never speak to him again were a small price to pay. Really, he deserved far worse. But here he was, somehow still alive while his past was dead. 

When the phone rang and it was MacLeod wanting to meet with him, Methos just said yes and asked where. 

"Holy ground, that cemetery," MacLeod said before hanging up, and Methos wasn't certain for whose protection that was supposed to be. He'd turned on his brothers, positioned his pieces, played his gambits, all to rid himself and the rest of the world of three men who had never moved out of the shadows. Who had still sought to darken everything they touched. But MacLeod wouldn't have ever been in a position like this. He'd never have taken up with someone like Kronos in the first place. He'd have taken Kronos' head within a day of meeting him. He'd have known, somehow.

Methos hadn't known. It had taken so long for him to walk away, and even then he couldn't quite recall what the impetus had been. How had he figured it out? How had he realized that he had to leave? Someone had said something to him. He knew that much. Someone whose face he saw in his dreams once every century or so. But the words themselves, the specifics, they were lost. It must have been quite the conversation.

It wasn't a long walk to the cemetery. Methos took his sword, just in case. It was only the cemetery he couldn't be challenged in, after all. MacLeod was easy to find, waiting near the entrance, and when Methos looked at him he couldn't quite tell if there was anything between them left worth salvaging. All he could do, in the end, was admit to his past, own up to his crimes, and hope MacLeod would see that he had been walking away from Kronos all these years. That he still was.

\--- 1997 - Bordeaux - Will and Bran ---

Bran managed to find his footing once they were out of the base, but he remained silent as they found their way back into the city and to their hotel. Will glanced at him once they were up in their room and found Bran had taken off his glasses and was looking at Will, eyes unblinking.

"I remember," Bran said after a moment. "I remember all of it. I remember meeting Merriman before I met you. I remember how Cafall died and why. I remember going into the mountain. I remember the three riddles and I remember the power of the Brenin Llwyd. I remember the Lost Land and the coming of the Dark and how they tried to take me out of time so they would win. And I remember why. I remember why, Will. I remember my father."

Will rocked back a little. He'd known this was coming, ever since he'd seen Bran's posture shift when they'd gone so far back in time. It had been inevitable, in a way, ever since he'd reconnected with Bran and they'd moved in together. Perhaps it would have happened anyhow. What Bran was, well, he was human, mortal, but also more. He had made a choice to help the Light, but the Light's magic couldn't quite touch him the same way it did normal people. Arthur's son couldn't be made to forget what he was. Not forever.

"It had to be this way," Bran continued. "I know. We were supposed to forget, to live our lives as normally as we could, to not go about dwelling on what we'd seen. It was too big for most people to handle."

Will nodded. "It would overwhelm most, yes. If Jane and Barney and Simon were to remember, if John Rowlands knew, it would consume them."

"What about me?" Bran asked, tilting his head a bit. "Will I worry at it like a sore tooth? Prod at it until I can think of nothing else?"

"I don't think so," Will told him. "You're made of sterner stuff, and you know it. I couldn't say anything, not unless you remembered on your own. You'd have thought me mad, or, at best, joking. The forgetting, it wasn't my doing. I couldn't undo it myself."

Bran said nothing. He sat there, still staring at Will, still unreadable. Then he leaned forward and brushed his lips over Will's forehead.

"You are forgiven, cariad. It was an impossible situation and now it is done. No more of these secrets between us?"

Will shook his head. "No more secrets. To be honest, I will be glad to be able to tell you about it all. I've needed someone at my side."


End file.
